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1907 

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BY 



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ILLUSTRATED BY 

LUCIUS HITCHCOCK 




NEW YORK AND LONDON 
HARPER & BROTHERS 
PUBLISHERS :: MCMVII 



P S|3zx 
•H55 

"K 2. 



LiBRAKY of CONGRESS 


Two CoDies 


Received 


OCT 24 


1907 


Copyng-ht 


Entry 


CLASS 


XXc. No, 


COPY 


A. 









n 
:3. 



Copyright, 1906, by Harper & Brothers. 

All rights reserved. 
Published October, 1907. 



Contents 

CHAP. PAGE 

I. Soldier Boy — Privately to 

Himself i 

II. Letter from Rouen — To Gen- 

eral Alison 12 

III. General Alison to His Mother 19 

IV. Cathy to Her Aunt Mercedes 25 

V. General Alison to Mercedes 33 

VI. Soldier Boy and the Mexican 

Plug 56 

VII. Soldier Boy and Shekels . . 82 

VIII. The Scout-start. BB and Lieu- 

tenant-General Alison . 8S 

IX. Soldier Boy and Shekels 

Again . 90 

X. General Alison and Dorcas . 100 

XI. Several Months Later. An- 

tonio AND THORNDIKE . . Il6 

XII. Mongrel and the Other Horse 129 

XIII. General Alison to His Mother 133 

XIV. Soldier Boy — To Himself . . 145 

XV. General Alison to Mrs. Drake, 

the Colonel's Wife . . 149 



Illustrations 

'buffalo bill took me on sol- 
dier BOY TO THUNDER-BIRD'S 
CAMP" Frontispiece ' 

'LOOK AT THAT PILE OF CATS IN 

YOUR CHAIR'" Facing p. 48- 

EVERY MORNING THEY GO CLAT- 
TERING DOWN INTO THE PLAIN " " 66- 

THERE WAS NOTHING TO DO BUT 

STAND BY " 92 

HIS STRENGTH FAILED AND HE 

FELL AT HER FEET" .... " 150 



Acknowledgments 

Although I have had several oppor- 
tunities to see a bull-fight, I have never 
seen one; but I needed a bull-fight in 
this book, and a trustworthy one will 
be found in it. I got it out of John 
Hay's Castilian Days, reducing and con- 
densing it to fit the requirements of this 
small story. Mr. Hay and I were 
friends from early times, and if he were 
still with us he would not rebuke me for 
the liberty I have taken. 

The knowledge of military minutiae 
exhibited in this book will be found to 
be correct, but it is not mine; I took 
it from Army Regulations, ed. 1904; 
Hardy's Tactics — Cavalry, revised ed., 
1 861; and Jomini's Handbook of Mili- 
tary Etiquette, West,Point ed., 1905. 
vii 



It would not be honest in me to en- 
courage by silence the inference that I 
composed the Horse's private bugle-call, 
for I did not. I lifted it, as Aristotle 
says. It is the opening strain in The 
Pizzicato in Sylvia, by Delibes. When 
that master was composing it he did 
not know it was a bugle-call, it was I 
that found it out. 

Along through the book I have dis- 
tributed a few anachronisms and unborn 
historical incidents and such things, so 
as to help the tale over the difficult 
places. This idea is not original with 
me; I got it out of Herodotus. Herodo- 
tus says, "Very few things happen at 
the right time, and the rest do not hap- 
pen at all: the conscientious historian 
will correct these defects." 

The cats in the chair do not belong to 
me, but to another. 

These are all the exceptions. What 
is left of the book is mine. 

MARK TWAIN. 

Lone Tree Hill, Dublin, 

New Hampshire, October, 1905. 

viii 



Part I 



A Horse's Tale 




SOLDIER BOY — PRIVATELY TO HIMSELF 

AM Buffalo Bill's horse. 
I have spent my life 
under his saddle — with 
him in it, too, and he is 
good for two hundred pounds, without 
his clothes ; and there is no telling how 
much he does weigh when he is out on 
the war-path and has his batteries 
belted on. He is over six feet, is 
young, hasn't an ounce of waste flesh, 
i 



A Horse's Tale 

is straight, graceful, springy in his 
motions, quick as a cat, and has a 
handsome face, and black hair dan- 
gling down on his shoulders, and is 
beautiful to look at; and nobody is 
braver than he is, and nobody is 
stronger, except myself. Yes, a per- 
son that doubts that he is fine to see 
should see him in his beaded buck- 
skins, on my back and his rifle peep- 
ing above his shoulder, chasing a 
hostile trail, with me going like the 
wind and his hair streaming out be- 
hind from the shelter of his broad 
slouch. Yes, he is a sight to look 
at then — and I'm part of it myself. 

I am his favorite horse, out of 
dozens. Big as he is, I have carried 
him eighty-one miles between night- 
fall and sunrise on the scout; and I 



A Horse's Tale 

am good for fifty, day in and day out, 
and all the time. I am not large, but 
I am built on a business basis. I 
have carried him thousands and thou- 
sands of miles on scout duty for the 
army, and there's not a gorge, nor a 
pass, nor a valley, nor a fort, nor a 
trading post, nor a buffalo-range in 
the whole sweep of the Rocky Moun- 
tains and the Great Plains that we 
don't know as well as we know the 
bugle-calls. He is Chief of Scouts 
to the Army of the Frontier, and it 
makes us very important. In such 
a position as I hold in the military 
service one needs to be of good family 
and possess an education much above 
the common to be worthy of the place. 
I am the best-educated horse outside 
of the hippodrome, everybody says, 
3 



A Horse's Tale 

and the best-mannered. It may be 
so, it is not for me to say ; modesty is 
the best policy, I think. Buffalo Bill 
taught me the most of what I know, 
my mother taught me much, and I 
taught myself the rest. Lay a row 
of moccasins before me — Pawnee, 
Sioux, Shoshone, Cheyenne, Black- 
foot, and as many other tribes as you 
please — and I can name the tribe ev- 
ery moccasin belongs to by the make 
of it. Name it in horse- talk, and could 
do it in American if I had speech. 

I know some of the Indian signs — 
the signs they make with their hands, 
and by signal -fires at night and 
columns of smoke by day. Buffalo 
Bill taught me how to drag wounded 
soldiers out of the line of fire with my 
teeth; and I've done it, too; at least 
4 



A Horse's Talc 

I've dragged him out of the battle 
when he was wounded. And not just 
once, but twice. Yes, I know a lot of 
things. I remember forms, and gaits, 
and faces; and you can't disguise a 
person that's done me a kindness so 
that I won't know him thereafter 
wherever I find him. I know the art 
of searching for a trail, and I know the 
stale track from the fresh. I can 
keep a trail all by myself, with Buffalo 
Bill asleep in the saddle; ask him — 
he will tell you so. Many a time, 
when he has ridden all night, he has 
said to me at dawn, " Take the watch, 
Boy; if the trail freshens, call me." 
Then he goes to sleep. He knows he 
can trust me, because I have a repu- 
tation. A scout horse that has a 
reputation does not play with it. 
5 



A Horse's Tale 

My mother was all American — no 
alkali-spider about her, I can tell you ; 
she was of the best blood of Kentucky, 
the bluest Blue-grass aristocracy, very 
proud and acrimonious — or maybe it 
is ceremonious. I don't know which 
it is. But it is no matter ; size is the 
main thing about a word, and that 
one's up to standard. She spent her 
military life as colonel of the Tenth 
Dragoons, and saw a deal of rough 
service — distinguished service it was, 
too. I mean, she carried the Colonel ; 
but it's all the same. Where would 
he be without his horse ? He wouldn't 
arrive. It takes two to make a 
colonel of dragoons. She was a fine 
dragoon horse, but never got above 
that. She was strong enough for the 
scout service, and had the endurance, 
6 



A Horse's Tale 

too, but she couldn't quite come up to 
the speed required; a scout horse has 
to have steel in his muscle and light- 
ning in his blood. 

My father was a bronco. Nothing 
as to lineage — that is, nothing as 
to recent lineage — but plenty good 
enough when you go a good way 
back. When Professor Marsh was 
out here hunting bones for the chapel 
of Yale University he found skeletons 
of horses no bigger than a fox, bedded 
in the rocks, and he said they were 
ancestors of my father. My mother 
heard him say it; and he said those 
skeletons were two million years old, 
which astonished her and made her 
Kentucky pretensions look small and 
pretty antiphonal, not to say oblique. 
Let me see. ... I used to know the 
7 



A Horse's Tale 

meaning of those words, but . . . well, 
it was years ago, and 'tisn't as vivid 
now as it was when they were fresh. 
That sort of words doesn't keep, in the 
kind of climate we have out here. Pro- 
fessor Marsh said those skeletons were 
fossils. So that makes me part blue 
grass and part fossil; if there is any 
older or better stock, you will have 
to look for it among the Four Hun- 
dred, I reckon. I am satisfied with 
it. And am a happy horse, too, 
though born out of wedlock. 

And now we are back at Fort 
Paxton once more, after a forty- 
day scout, away up as far as the Big 
Horn. Everything quiet. Crows 
and Blackfeet squabbling — as usual 
— but no outbreaks, and settlers 
feeling fairly easy. 



A Horse's Tale 

The Seventh Cavalry still in garri- 
son, here; also the Ninth Dragoons, 
two artillery companies, and some in- 
fantry. All glad to see me, including 
General Alison, commandant. The 
officers' ladies and children well, and 
called upon me — with sugar. Colonel 
Drake, Seventh Cavalry, said some 
pleasant things ; Mrs. Drake was very 
complimentary ; also Captain and Mrs. 
Marsh, Company B, Seventh Cavalry; 
also the Chaplain, who is always kind 
and pleasant to me, because I kicked 
the lungs out of a trader once. It 
was Tommy Drake and Fanny Marsh 
that furnished the sugar — nice chil- 
dren, the nicest at the post, I think. 

That poor orphan child is on her 
way from France — everybody is full 
of the subject. Her father was Gen- 
9 



A Horse's Tale 

eral Alison's brother; married a beau- 
tiful young Spanish lady ten years 
ago, and has never been in America 
since. They lived in Spain a year or 
two, then went to France. Both died 
some months ago. This little girl 
that is coming is the only child. 
General Alison is glad to have her. 
He has never seen her. He is a very 
nice old bachelor, but is an old 
bachelor just the same and isn't more 
than about a year this side of retire- 
ment by age limit; and so what does 
he know about taking care of a little 
maid nine years old ? If I could have 
her it would be another matter, for I 
know all about children, and they 
adore me. Buffalo Bill will tell you 
so himself. 

I have some of this news from over- 

10 



A Horse's Tale 

hearing the garrison-gossip, the rest 
of it I got from Potter, the General's 
dog. Potter is the great Dane. He 
is privileged, all over the post, like 
Shekels, the Seventh Cavalry's dog, 
and visits everybody's quarters and 
picks up everything that is going, in 
the way of news. Potter has no imag- 
ination, and no great deal of culture, 
perhaps, but he has a historical mind 
and a good memory, and so he is the 
person I depend upon mainly to post 
me up when I get back from a scout. 
That is, if Shekels is out on depreda- 
tion and I can't get hold of him. 



II 

LETTER FROM ROUEN — TO GENERAL 
ALISON 




\Y dear Brother-in-Law, — 
Please let me write again 
in Spanish, I cannot trust 
my English, and I am 
aware, from what your brother used 
to say, that army officers educated 
at the Military Academy of the United 
States are taught our tongue. It is 
as I told you in my other letter : both 
my poor sister and her husband, when 
they found they could not recover, 
expressed the wish that you should 



12 



A Horse's Tale 

have their little Catherine — as know- 
ing that you would presently be re- 
tired from the army — rather than 
that she should remain with me, who 
am broken in health, or go to your 
mother in California, whose health 
is also frail. 

You do not know the child, there- 
fore I must tell you something about 
her. You will not be ashamed of her 
looks, for she is a copy in little of her 
beautiful mother — and it is that 
Andalusian beauty which is not sur- 
passable, even in your country. She 
has her mother's charm and grace 
and good heart and sense of justice, 
and she has her father's vivacity and 
cheerfulness and pluck and spirit of 
enterprise, with the affectionate dis- 
position and sincerity of both parents. 
13 



A Horse's Tale 

My sister pined for her Spanish 
home all these years of exile ; she was 
always talking of Spain to the child, 
and tending and nourishing the love 
of Spain in the little thing's heart as 
a precious flower ; and she died happy 
in the knowledge that the fruitage of 
her patriotic labors was as rich as 
even she could desire. 

Cathy is a sufficiently good little 
scholar, for her nine years ; her mother 
taught her Spanish herself, and kept 
it always fresh upon her ear and her 
tongue by hardly ever speaking with 
her in any other tongue; her father 
was her English teacher, and talked 
with her in that language almost ex- 
clusively ; French has been her every- 
day speech for more than seven years 
among her playmates here; she has 
14 



A Horse's Tale 

a good working use of governess — 
German and Italian. It is true that 
there is always a faint foreign fra- 
grance about her speech, no matter 
what language she is talking, but it 
is only just noticeable, nothing more, 
and is rather a charm than a mar, I 
think. In the ordinary child-studies 
Cathy is neither before nor behind the 
average child of nine, I should say. 
But I can say this for her : in love for 
her friends and in high-mindedness 
and good-heartedness she has not 
many equals, and in my opinion no 
superiors. And I beg of you, let 
her have her way with the dumb ani- 
mals — they are her worship. It is an 
inheritance from her mother. She 
knows but little of cruelties and op- 
pressions — keep them from her sight 
15 



A Horse's Tale 

if you can. She would flare up at 
them and make trouble, in her small 
but quite decided and resolute way; 
for she has a character of her own, 
and lacks neither promptness nor 
initiative. Sometimes her judgment 
is at fault, but I think her intentions 
are always right. Once when she was 
a little creature of three or four years 
she suddenly brought her tiny foot 
down upon the floor in an apparent 
outbreak of indignation, then fetched 
it a backward wipe, and stooped down 
to examine the result. Her mother 
said: 

"Why, what is it, child? What 
has stirred you so?" 

"Mamma, the big ant was trying 
to kill the little one." 
' 'And so you protected the little one." 
16 



A Horse's Tale 

"Yes, mamma, because he had no 
friend, and I wouldn't let the big one 
kill him." 

"But you have killed them both." 

Cathy was distressed, . and her lip 
trembled. She picked up the re- 
mains and laid them upon her palm, 
and said: 

" Poor little anty, I'm so sorry; and 
I didn't mean to kill you, but there 
wasn't any other way to save you, it 
was such a hurry." 

She is a dear and sweet little lady, 
and when she goes it will give me a 
sore heart. But she will be happy 
with you, and if your heart is old 
and tired, give it into her keeping; 
she will make it young again, she will 
refresh it, she will make it sing. Be 
good to her, for all our sakes ! 
17 



A Horse's Tale 

My exile will soon be over now. 
As soon as I am a little stronger I shall 
see my Spain again; and that will 
make me young again! 

Mercedes. 




Ill 

GENERAL ALISON TO HIS MOTHER 

AM glad to know that 
you are all well, in San 
Bernardino. 

. . . That grandchild of 
yours has been here — well, I do not 
quite know how many days it is; 
nobody can keep account of days or 
anything else where she is! Mother, 
she did what the Indians were never 
able to do. She took the Fort — took 
it the first day! Took me, too; took 
the colonels, the captains, the women, 
the children, and the dumb brutes; 
19 



A Horse's Tale 

took Buffalo Bill, and all his scouts; 
took the garrison — to the last man; 
and in forty-eight hours the Indian 
encampment was hers, illustrious old 
Thunder-Bird and all. Do I seem 
to have lost my solemnity, my 
gravity, my poise, my dignity? You 
would lose your own, in my circum- 
stances. Mother, you never saw such 
a winning little devil. She is all 
energy, and spirit, and sunshine, and 
interest in everybody and everything, 
and pours out her prodigal love upon 
every creature that will take it, high 
or low, Christian or pagan, feathered 
or furred ; and none has declined it to 
date, and none ever will, I think. 
But she has a temper, and sometimes 
it catches fire and flames up, and 
is likely to burn whatever is near it; 
20 



A Horse's Tale 

but it is soon over, the passion goes 
as quickly as it comes. Of course she 
has an Indian name already; Indians 
always rechristen a stranger early. 
Thunder-Bird attended to her case. 
He gave her the Indian equivalent 
for firebug, or fire-fly. He said : 

11 'Times, ver' quiet, ver' soft, like 
summer night, but when she mad she 
blaze." 

Isn't it good? Can't you see the 
flare ? She's beautiful, mother, beau- 
tiful as a picture ; and there is a touch 
of you in her face, and of her father 
— poor George! and in her unresting 
activities, and her fearless ways, and 
her sunbursts and cloudbursts, she 
is always bringing George back to me. 
These impulsive natures are dramatic. 
George was dramatic, so is this 

21 



A Horse's Talc 

Lightning-Bug, so is Buffalo Bill. 
When Cathy first arrived — it was in 
the forenoon — Buffalo Bill was away, 
carrying orders to Major Fuller, at 
Five Forks, up in the Clayton Hills. 
At mid-afternoon I was at my desk, 
trying to work, and this sprite had 
been making it impossible for half an 
hour. At last I said: 

"Oh, you bewitching little scamp, 
can't you be quiet just a minute 
or two, and let your poor old un- 
cle attend to a part of his du- 
ties?" 

"I'll try, uncle; I will, indeed," she 
said. 

"Well, then, that's a good child — 
kiss me. Now, then, sit up in that 
chair, and set your eye on that clock. 
There — that's right. If you stir — 

22 



A Horse's Tale 

if you so much as wink — for four 
whole minutes, I'll bite you!" 

It was very sweet and humble and 
obedient she looked, sitting there, 
still as a mouse; I could hardly keep 
from setting her free and telling her 
to make as much racket as she wanted 
to. During as much as two minutes 
there was a most unnatural and 
heavenly quiet and repose, then 
Buffalo Bill came thundering up to 
the door in all his scout finery, flung 
himself out of the saddle, said to 
his horse, "Wait for me, Boy," and 
stepped in, and stopped dead in his 
tracks — gazing at the child. She 
forgot orders, and was on the floor 
in a moment, saying: 

"Oh, you are so beautiful! Do 
you like me?" 

3 23 



A Horse's Talc 

"No, I don't, I love you!" and he 
gathered her up with a hug, and then 
set her on his shoulder — apparently 
nine feet from the floor. 

She was at home. She played with 
his long hair, and admired his big 
hands and his clothes and his car- 
bine, and asked question after ques- 
tion, as fast as he could answer, until 
I excused them both for half an hour, 
in order to have a chance to finish 
my work. Then I heard Cathy ex- 
claiming over Soldier Boy; and he 
was worthy of her raptures, for he 
is a wonder of a horse, and has a 
reputation which is as shining as his 
own silken hide. 




IV 

CATHY TO HER AUNT MERCEDES 

fH, it is wonderful here, 
aunty dear, just paradise ! 
Oh, if you could only see 
it ! everything so wild and 
lovely; such grand plains, stretching 
such miles and miles and miles, all 
the most delicious velvety sand and 
sage-brush, and rabbits as big as a 
dog, and such tall and noble jackassful 
ears that that is what they name them 
by; and such vast mountains, and so 
rugged and craggy and lofty, with 
cloud-shawls wrapped around their 
25 



A Horse's Tale 

shoulders, and looking so solemn and 
awful and satisfied ; and the charming 
Indians, oh, how you would dote on 
them, aunty dear, and they would 
on you, too, and they would let you 
hold their babies, the way they do 
me, and they are the fattest, and 
brownest, and sweetest little things, 
and never cry, and wouldn't if they 
had pins sticking in them, which they 
haven't, because they are poor and 
can't afford it; and the horses and 
mules and cattle and dogs — hundreds 
and hundreds and hundreds, and not 
an animal that you can't do what 
you please with, except uncle Thomas, 
but I don't mind him, he's lovely; 
and oh, if you could hear the bugles : 
too — too — too-too — too — too, and so on 
— per-fectly beautiful! Do you rec- 
26 



A Horse's Tale 

ognize that one? It's the first toots 
of the reveille; it goes, dear me, so 
early in the morning! — then I and 
every other soldier on the whole 
place are up and out in a minute, 
except uncle Thomas, who is most 
unaccountably lazy, I don't know 
why, but I have talked to him about 
it, and I reckon it will be better, now. 
He hasn't any faults much, and is 
charming and sweet, like Buffalo 
Bill, and Thunder-Bird, and Mammy 
Dorcas, and Soldier Boy, and Shekels, 
and Potter, and Sour-Mash, and — 
well, they're all that, just angels, as 
you may say. 

The very first day I came, I don't 
know how long ago it was, Buffalo Bill 
took me on Soldier Boy to Thunder- 
Bird's camp, not the big one which is 
27 



A Horse's Tale 

out on the plain, which is White 
Cloud's, he took me to that one next 
day, but this one is four or five miles 
up in the hills and crags, where there 
is a great shut -in meadow, full of 
Indian lodges and dogs and squaws 
and everything that is interesting, 
and a brook of the clearest water 
running through it, with white pebbles 
on the bottom and trees all along the 
banks cool and shady and good to 
wade in, and as the sun goes down it 
is dimmish in there, but away up 
against the sky you see the big peaks 
towering up and shining bright and 
vivid in the sun, and sometimes an 
eagle sailing by them, not napping 
a wing, the same as if he was asleep ; 
and young Indians and girls romping 
and laughing and carrying on, around 
28 



A Horse's Tale 

the spring and the pool, and not 
much clothes on except the girls, 
and dogs fighting, and the squaws 
busy at work, and the bucks busy 
resting, and the old men sitting in a 
bunch smoking, and passing the pipe 
not to the left but to the right, which 
means there's been a row in the camp 
and they are settling it if they can, 
and children playing just the same 
as any other children, and little boys 
shooting at a mark with bows, and 
I cuffed one of them because he hit a 
dog with a club that wasn't doing 
anything, and he resented it but be- 
fore long he wished he hadn't: but 
this sentence is getting too long and 
I will start another. Thunder-Bird 
put on his Sunday-best war outfit 
to let me see him, and he was splendid 



A Horse's Tale 

to look at, with his face painted red 
and bright and intense like a fire- 
coal and a valance of eagle feathers 
from the top of his head all down his 
back, and he had his tomahawk, too, 
and his pipe, which has a stem which 
is longer than my arm, and I never 
had such a good time in an Indian 
camp in my life, and I learned a lot 
of words of the language, and next 
day BB took me to the camp out on 
the Plains, four miles, and I had an- 
other good time and got acquainted 
with some more Indians and dogs; 
and the big chief, by the name of 
White Cloud, gave me a pretty little 
bow and arrows and I gave him my 
red sash-ribbon, and in four days I 
could shoot very well with it and beat 
any white boy of my size at the post ; 
30 



A Horse's Tale 

and I have been to those camps 
plenty of times since; and I have 
learned to ride, too, BB taught me, 
and every day he practises me and 
praises me, and every time I do 
better than ever he lets me have a 
scamper on Soldier Boy, and that's 
the last agony of pleasure! for he is 
the charmingest horse, and so beau- 
tiful and shiny and black, and hasn't 
another color on him anywhere, 
except a white star in his forehead, 
not just an imitation star, but a real 
one, with four points, shaped exactly 
like a star that's hand-made, and 
if you should cover him all up but his 
star you would know him anywhere, 
even in Jerusalem or Australia, by 
that. And I got acquainted with a 
good many of the Seventh Cavalry, 
3i 



A Horse's Tale 

and the dragoons, and officers, and 
families, and horses, in the first few 
days, and some more in the next few 
and the next few and the next few, 
and now I know more soldiers and 
horses than you can think, no matter 
how hard you try. I am keeping up 
my studies every now and then, but 
there isn't much time for it. I love 
you so! and I send you a hug and a 
kiss. Cathy. 

P.S. — I belong to the Seventh 
Cavalry and Ninth Dragoons, I am 
an officer, too, and do not have to 
work on account of not getting any 
wages. 




V 

GENERAL ALISON TO MERCEDES 

'HE has been with us a 
good nice long time, now. 
You are troubled about 
your sprite because this 
is such a wild frontier, hundreds of 
miles from civilization, and peopled 
only by wandering tribes of savages ? 
You fear for her safety ? Give your- 
self no uneasiness about her. Dear 
me, she's in a nursery! and she's got 
more than eighteen hundred nurses. 
It would distress the garrison to 
suspect that you think they can't 
33 



A Horse's Tale 

take care of her. They think they 
can. They would tell you so them- 
selves. You see, the Seventh Cavalry 
has never had a child of its very own 
before, and neither has the Ninth 
Dragoons; and so they are like all 
new mothers, they think there is 
no other child like theirs, no other 
child so wonderful, none that is so 
worthy to be faithfully and tenderly 
looked after and protected. These 
bronzed veterans of mine are very 
good mothers, I think, and wiser than 
some other mothers; for they let her 
take lots of risks, and it is a good 
education for her ; and the more risks 
she takes and comes successfully out 
of, the prouder they are of her. They 
adopted her, with grave and formal 
military ceremonies of their own in- 
34 



A Horse's Talc 

vention — solemnities is the truer word ; 
solemnities that were so profoundly 
solemn and earnest, that the spectacle 
would have been comical if it hadn't 
been so touching. It was a good 
show, and as stately and complex as 
guard-mount and the trooping of the 
colors; and it had its own special 
music, composed for the occasion by 
the bandmaster of the Seventh; and 
the child was as serious as the most 
serious war-worn soldier of them all; 
and finally when they throned her 
upon the shoulder of the oldest 
veteran, and pronounced her "well 
and truly adopted," and the bands 
struck up and all saluted and she 
saluted in return, it was better and 
more moving than any kindred thing 
I have seen on the stage, because 
35 



A Horse's Tale 

stage things are make-believe, but 
this was real and the players' hearts 
were in it. 

It happened several weeks ago, and 
was followed by some .additional 
solemnities. The men created a 
couple of new ranks, thitherto un- 
known to the army regulations, and 
conferred them upon Cathy, with 
ceremonies suitable to a duke. So 
now she is Corporal-General of the 
Seventh Cavalry, and Flag-Lieuten- 
ant of the Ninth Dragoons, with the 
privilege (decreed by the men) of 
writing U.S.A. after her name! Also, 
they presented her a pair of shoulder- 
straps — both dark blue, the one with 
F. L. on it, the other with C. G. Also, 
a sword. She wears them. Finally, 
they granted her the salute* I am 
36 



A Horse's Talc 

witness that that ceremony is faith- 
fully observed by both parties — and 
most gravely and decorously, too. 
I have never seen a soldier smile yet, 
while delivering it, nor Cathy in re- 
turning it. 

Ostensibly I was not present at 
these proceedings, and am ignorant of 
them; but I was where I could see. 
I was afraid of one thing — the jeal- 
ousy of the other children of the post ; 
but there is nothing of that, I am 
glad to say. On the contrary, they 
are proud of their comrade and her 
honors. It is a surprising thing, but 
it is true. The children are devoted 
to Cathy, for she has turned their dull 
frontier life into a sort of continuous 
festival; also they know her for a 
stanch and steady friend, a friend 
37 



A Horse's Tale 

who can always be depended upon, 
and does not change with the weather. 
She has become a rather extra- 
ordinary rider, under the tutorship of 
a more than extraordinary teacher — 
BB, which is her pet name for Buffalo 
Bill. She pronounces it beeby. He 
has not only taught her seventeen 
ways of breaking her neck, but 
twenty-two ways of avoiding it. He 
has infused into her the best and 
surest protection of a horseman — 
confidence. He did it gradually, sys- 
tematically, little by little, a step at 
a time, and each step made sure be- 
fore the next was essayed. And so 
he inched her along up through 
terrors that had been discounted by 
training before she reached them, and 
therefore were not recognizable as 
38 



A Horse's Tale 

terrors when she got to them. Well, 
she is a daring little rider, now, and is 
perfect in what she knows of horse- 
manship. By-and-by she will know 
the art like a West Point cadet, and 
will exercise it as fearlessly. She 
doesn't know anything about side- 
saddles. Does that distress you? 
And she is a fine performer, without 
any saddle at all. Does that discom- 
fort you? Do not let it; she is not 
in any danger, I give you my word. 
You .said that if my heart was old 
and tired she would refresh it, and 
you said truly. I do not know how 
I got along without her, before. I 
was a forlorn old tree, but now that 
this blossoming vine has wound it- 
self about me and become the life 
of my life, it is very different. As a 
4 39 



A Horse's Tale 

furnisher of business for me and for 
Mammy Dorcas she is exhaustlessly 
competent, but I like my share of it 
and of course Dorcas likes hers, for 
Dorcas " raised" George, and Cathy 
is George over again in so many ways 
that she brings back Dorcas's youth 
and the joys of that long- vanished 
time. My father tried to set Dorcas 
free twenty years ago, when we still 
lived in Virginia, but without suc- 
cess ; she considered herself a member 
of the family, and wouldn't go. And 
so, a member of the family she re- 
mained, and has held that position 
unchallenged ever since, and holds 
it now ; for when my mother sent her 
here from San Bernardino when we 
learned that Cathy was coming, she 
only changed from one division of the 
40 



A Horse's Tale 

family to the other. She has the 
warm heart of her race, and its lavish 
affections, and when Cathy arrived 
the pair were mother and child in 
five minutes, and that is what they 
are to date and will continue. Dorcas 
really thinks she raised George, and 
that is one of her prides, but perhaps 
it was a mutual raising, for their ages 
were the same — thirteen years short 
of mine. But they were playmates, 
at any rate; as regards that, there is 
no room for dispute. 

Cathy thinks Dorcas is the best 
Catholic in America except herself. 
She could not pay any one a higher 
compliment than that, and Dorcas 
could not receive one that would 
please her better. Dorcas is satis- 
fied that there has never been a more 
41 



A Horse's Tale 

wonderful child than Cathy. She 
has conceived the curious idea that 
Cathy is twins, and that one of them 
is a boy-twin and failed to get segre- 
gated — got submerged, is the idea. 
To argue with her that this is non- 
sense is a waste of breath — her mind 
is made up, and arguments do not 
affect it. She says: 

"Look at her; she loves dolls, and 
girl-plays, and everything a girl loves, 
and she's gentle and sweet, and ain't 
cruel to dumb brutes — now that's 
the girl-twin, but she loves boy-plays, 
and drums and fifes and soldiering, 
and rough-riding, and ain't afraid of 
anybody or anything — and that's the 
boy-twin; 'deed you needn't tell me 
she's only one child; no, sir, she's 
twins, and one of them got shet up 
42 



A Horse's Tale 

out of sight. Out of sight, but that 
don't make any difference, that boy 
is in there, and you can see him look 
out of her eyes when her temper is 
up." 

Then Dorcas went on, in her simple 
and earnest way, to furnish illus- 
trations. 

"Look at that raven, Marse Tom. 
Would anybody befriend a raven but 
that child ? Of course they wouldn't ; 
it ain't natural. Well, the Injun boy 
had the raven tied up, and was all the 
time plaguing it and starving it, and 
she pitied the po' thing, and tried to 
buy it from the boy, and the tears was 
in her eyes. That was the girl-twin, 
you see. She offered him her thimble, 
and he flung it down ; she offered him 
all the doughnuts she had, which was 
43 



A Horse's Tale 

two, and he flung them down; she 
offered him half a paper of pins, worth 
forty ravens, and he made a mouth at 
her and jabbed one of them in the 
raven's back. That was the limit, 
you know. It called for the other 
twin. Her eyes blazed up, and she 
jumped for him like a wild-cat, and 
when she was done with him she was 
rags and he wasn't anything but an 
allegory. That was most undoubted- 
ly the other twin, you see, coming to 
the front. No, sir; don't tell me he 
ain't in there. I've seen him with 
my own eyes — and plenty of times, 
at that." 

"Allegory? What is an allegory?" 

"I don't know, Marse Tom, it's 

one of her words; she loves the big 

ones, you know, and I pick them up 

44 



A Horse's Tale 

from her; they sound good and I 
can't help it." 

" What happened after she had 
converted the boy into an alle- 
gory?" 

''Why, she untied the raven and 
confiscated him by force and fetched 
him home, and left the doughnuts and 
things on the ground. Petted him, 
of course, like she does with every 
creature. In two days she had him 
so stuck after her that she — well, 
you know how he follows her every- 
where, and sets on her shoulder often 
when she rides her breakneck ram- 
pages — all of which is the girl-twin to 
the front, you see — and he does what 
he pleases, and is up to all kinds of 
devilment, and is a perfect nuisance 
in the kitchen. Well, they all stand 
45 



A Horse's Tale 

it, but they wouldn't if it was another 
person's bird." 

Here she began to chuckle com- 
fortably, and presently she said: 

"Well, you know, she's a nuisance 
herself, Miss Cathy is, she is so busy, 
and into everything, like that bird. 
It's all just as innocent, you know, 
and she don't mean any harm, and is 
so good and dear; and it ain't her 
fault, it's her nature; her interest is 
always a-working and always red-hot, 
and she can't keep quiet. Well, 
yesterday it was ' Please, Miss Cathy, 
don't do that'; and, 'Please, Miss 
Cathy, let that alone'; and, 'Please, 
Miss Cathy, don't make so much 
noise'; and so on and so on, till I 
reckon I had found fault fourteen 
times in fifteen minutes; then she 
46 



A Horse's Tale 

looked up at me with her big brown 
eyes that can plead so, and said in 
that odd little foreign way that goes 
to your heart, 

"'Please, mammy, make me a 
compliment.'" 

"And of course you did it, you old 
fool?" 

" Marse Tom, I just grabbed her up 
to my breast and says, ' Oh, you po' 
dear little motherless thing, you ain't 
got a fault in the world, and you can 
do anything you w r ant to, and tear 
the house down, and yo' old black 
mammy won't say a word!'" 

"Why, of course, of course — / 
knew you'd spoil the child." 

She brushed away her tears, and 
said with dignity: 

"Spoil the child? spoil that child, 
47 



A Horse's Tale 

Marse Tom? There can't anybody 
spoil her. She's the king bee of this 
post, and everybody pets her and is 
her slave, and yet, as you know, your 
own self, she ain't the least little bit 
spoiled." Then she eased her mind 
with this retort: "Marse Tom, she 
makes you do anything she wants to, 
and you can't deny it; so if she could 
be spoilt, she'd been spoilt long ago, 
because you are the very worst! 
Look at that pile of cats in your chair, 
and you sitting on a candle-box, just 
as patient; it's because they're her 
cats." 

If Dorcas were a soldier, I could 
punish her for such large frankness 
as that. I changed the subject, and 
made her resume her illustrations. 
She had scored against me fairly, 
43 



-, 



fr.'\- 




^ L OOK AT THAT PILE OP CATS IN YOUR CHAIR 



A Horse's Tale 

and I wasn't going to cheapen her 
victory by disputing it. She pro- 
ceeded to offer this incident in evi- 
dence on her twin theory: 

"Two weeks ago when she got her 
finger mashed open, she turned pretty 
pale with the pain, but she never said 
a word. I took her in my lap, and 
the surgeon sponged off the blood and 
took a needle and thread and began 
to sew it up ; it had to have a lot of 
stitches, and each one made her 
scrunch a little, but she never let go 
a sound. At last the surgeon was so 
full of admiration that he said, 'Well, 
you are a brave little thing F and she 
said, just as ca'm and simple as if 
she was talking about the weather, 
'There isn't anybody braver but the 
Cid I ' You see ? it was the boy- 
49 



A Horse's Talc 

twin that the surgeon was a-dealing 
with." 

"WhoistheCid?" 

" I don't know, sir — at least only 
what she says. She's always talking 
about him, and says he was the 
bravest hero Spain ever had, or any 
other country. They have it up and 
down, the children do, she standing up 
for the Cid, and they working George 
Washington for all he is worth." 

"Do they quarrel?" 

"No; it's only disputing, and brag- 
ging, the way children do. They 
want her to be an American, but she 
can't be anything but a Spaniard, 
she says. You see, her mother was 
always longing for home, po' thing! 
and thinking about it, and so the child 
is just as much a Spaniard as if she'd 
50 



A Horse's Tale 

always lived there. She thinks she 
remembers how Spain looked, but I 
reckon she don't, because she was only 
a baby when they moved to France. 
She is very proud to be a Spaniard." 

Does that please you, Mercedes? 
Very well, be content; your niece is 
loyal to her allegiance: her mother 
laid deep the foundations of her love 
for Spain, and she will go back to you 
as good a Spaniard as you are your- 
self. She has made me promise to 
take her to you for a long visit when 
the War Office retires me. 

I attend to her studies myself; has 
she told you that? Yes, I am her 
school-master, and she makes pretty 
good progress, I think, everything 
considered. Everything considered 
— being translated — means holidays. 
5i 



A Horse's Tale 

But the fact is, she was not born for 
study, and it comes hard. Hard for 
me, too; it hurts me like a physical 
pain to see that free spirit of the air 
and the sunshine laboring and griev- 
ing over a book ; and sometimes when 
I find her gazing far away towards 
the plain and the blue mountains with 
the longing in her eyes, I have to 
throw open the prison doors; I can't 
help it. A quaint little scholar she is, 
and makes plenty of blunders. Once 
I put the question : 

"What does the Czar govern?" 
She rested her elbow on her knee 
and her chin on her hand and took 
that problem under deep considera- 
tion. Presently she looked up and 
answered, with a rising inflection 
implying a shade of uncertainty, 
52 



A Horse's Tale 

"The dative case?" 

Here are a couple of her expositions 
which were delivered with tranquil 
confidence : 

"Chaplain, diminutive of chap. 
Lass is masculine, lassie is feminine." 

She is not a genius, you see, but 
just a normal child; they all make 
mistakes of that sort. There is a 
glad light in her eye which is pretty 
to see when she finds herself able 
to answer a question promptly and 
accurately, without any hesitation; 
as, for instance, this morning: 

"Cathy dear, what is a cube?" 

"Why, a native of Cuba." 

She still drops a foreign word into 
her talk now and then, and there is 
still a subtle foreign flavor or fra- 
grance about even her exactest Eng- 
53 



A Horse's Talc 

lish — and long may this abide! for it 
has for mc a charm that is very 
pleasant. Sometimes her English is 
daintily prim and bookish and capti- 
vating. She has a child's sweet tooth, 
but for her health's sake I try to keep 
its inspirations under check. She is 
obedient — as is proper for a titled and 
recognized military personage, which 
she is — but the chain presses some- 
times. For instance, we were out for 
a walk, and passed by some bushes 
that were freighted with wild goose- 
berries. Her face brightened and she 
put her hands together and delivered 
herself of this speech, most feelingly: 

"Oh, if I was permitted a vice it 
would be the gourmandisc!" 

Could I resist that? No. I gave 
her a gooseberry. 

54 



A Horse's Tale 

You ask about her languages. 
They take care of themselves; they 
will not get rusty here ; our regiments 
are not made up of natives alone — 
tar from it. And she is picking up 
Indian tongues diligently. 



VI 

SOLDIER BOY AND THE MEXICAN 
PLUG 




|HEN did you come?" 
" Arrived at sundown. " 
"Where from?" 
"Salt Lake." 
"Are you in the service?" 
"No. Trade." 
"Pirate trade, I reckon." 
"What do you know about it?" 
"I saw you when you came. I 
recognized your master. He is a 
bad sort. Trap-robber, horse-thief, 
squaw-man, renegado — Hank Butters 
56 



A Horse's Tale 

— I know him very well. Stole you, 
didn't he?" 

" Well, it amounted to that. " 

" I thought so. Where is his pard ?" 

4 'He stopped at White Cloud's 
camp." 

" He is another of the same stripe, 
is Blake Haskins." (Aside.) They are 
laying for Buffalo Bill again, I guess. 
(Aloud.) "What is your name?" 

"Which one?" 

"Have you got more than one?" 

"I get a new one every time I'm 
stolen. I used to have an honest 
name, but that was early; I've for- 
gotten it. Since then I've had 
thirteen aliases." 

"Aliases? What is alias?" 

"A false name." 

" Alias. It's a fine large word, and 
57 



A Horse's Tale 

is in my line; it has quite a learned 
and cerebrospinal incandescent sound . 
Are you educated?" 

"Well, no, I can't claim it. I can 
take down bars, I can distinguish 
oats from shoe-pegs, I can blaspheme 
a saddle-boil with the college-bred, 
and I know a few other things — not 
many; I have had no chance, I have 
always had to work; besides, I am 
of low birth and no family. You 
speak my dialect like a native, but 
you are not a Mexican Plug, you are 
a gentleman, I can see that; and 
educated, of course." 

" Yes, I am of old family, and not 
illiterate. I am a fossil." 

"A which?" 

' ' Fossil . The first horses were fossils . 
They date back two million years." 
58 



A Horse's Tale 

"Gr-eat sand and sage-brush! do 
you mean it?" 

" Yes, it is true. The bones of my 
ancestors are held in reverence and 
worship, even by men. They do not 
leave them exposed to the weather 
when they find them, but carry them 
three thousand miles and enshrine 
them in their temples of learning, 
and worship them." 

"It is wonderful! I knew you 
must be a person of distinction, by 
your fine presence and courtly ad- 
dress, and by the fact that you 
are not subjected to the indignity 
of hobbles, like myself and the 
rest. Would you tell me your 
name?" 

"You have probably heard of it — 
Soldier Boy." 

59 



A Horse's Tale 

"What! — the renowned, the illus- 
trious?" 

"Even so." 

"It takes my breath! Little did I 
dream that ever I should stand face to 
face with the possessor of that great 
name. Buffalo Bill's horse! Known 
from the Canadian border to the 
deserts of Arizona, and from the 
eastern marches of the Great Plains 
to the foot-hills of the Sierra! Truly 
this is a memorable day. You still 
serve the celebrated Chief of Scouts ?" 

" I am still his property, but he has 
lent me, for a time, to the most noble, 
the most gracious, the most excellent, 
her Excellency Catherine, Corporal- 
General Seventh Cavalry and Flag- 
Lieutenant Ninth Dragoons, U.S.A., — 
on whom be peace!" 
60 



A Horse's Tale 

"Amen. Did you say her Excel- 
lency?" 

" The same. A Spanish lady, sweet 
blossom of a ducal house. And truly 
a wonder ; knowing everything, capa- 
ble of everything; speaking all the 
languages, master of all sciences, a 
mind without horizons, a heart of 
gold, the glory of her race ! On whom 
be peace!" • 

"Amen. It is marvellous!" 
"Verily. I knew many things, she 
has taught me others. I am edu- 
cated. I will tell you about her." 
"I listen — I am enchanted." 
"I will tell a plain tale, calmly, 
without excitement, without elo- 
quence. When she had been here 
four or five weeks she was already 
erudite in military things, and they 
61 



A Horse's Tale 

made her an officer — a double officer. 
She rode the drill every day, like any 
soldier; and she could take the bugle 
and direct the evolutions herself. 
Then, on a day, there was a grand 
race, for prizes — none to enter but the 
children. Seventeen children enter- 
ed, and she was the youngest. Three 
girls, fourteen boys — good riders all. 
It was a steeplechase, with four 
hurdles, all pretty high. The first 
prize was a most cunning half -grown 
silver bugle, and mighty pretty, with 
red silk cord and tassels. Buffalo 
Bill was very anxious; for he had 
taught her to ride, and he did most 
dearly want her to win that race, for 
the glory of it. So he wanted her to 
ride me, but she wouldn't; and she 
reproached him, and said it was un- 
62 



A Horse's Tale 

fair and unright, and taking ad- 
vantage; for what horse in this post 
or any other could stand a chance 
against me? and she was very severe 
with him, and said, 'You ought to 
be ashamed — you are proposing to me 
conduct unbecoming an officer and a 
gentleman.' So he just tossed her up 
in the air about thirty feet and caught 
her as she came down, and said he 
was ashamed; and put up his hand- 
kerchief and pretended to cry, which 
nearly broke her heart, and she petted 
him, and begged him to forgive her, 
and said she would do anything in the 
world he could ask but that; but he 
said he ought to go hang himself, 
and he must, if he could get a rope; 
it was nothing but right he should, 
for he never, never could forgive him- 
63 



A Horse's Talc 

self; and then she began to cry, and 
they both sobbed, the way you could 
hear him a mile, and she clinging 
around his neck and pleading, till at 
last he was comforted a little, and 
gave his solemn promise he wouldn't 
hang himself till after the race; and 
wouldn't do it at all if she won it, 
which made her happy, and she said 
she would win it or die in the saddle ; 
so then everything was pleasant again 
and both of them content. He can't 
help playing jokes on her, he is so 
fond of her and she is so innocent and 
unsuspecting; and when she finds it 
out she cuffs him and is in a fury, but 
presently forgives him because it's 
him; and maybe the very next day 
she's caught with another joke; you 
see she can't learn any better, because 
64 



A Horse's Tale 

she hasn't any deceit in her, and that 
kind aren't ever expecting it in an- 
other person. 

"It was a grand race. The whole 
post was there, and there was such 
another whooping and shouting when 
the seventeen kids came flying down 
the turf and sailing over the hurdles 
— oh, beautiful to see! Half-way 
down, it was kind of neck and neck, 
and anybody's race and nobody's. 
Then, what should happen but a cow 
steps out and puts her head down to 
munch grass, with her broadside to 
the battalion, and they a-coming like 
the wind; they split apart to flank 
her, but she? — why, she drove the 
spurs home and soared over that 
cow like a bird ! and on she went, and 
cleared the last hurdle solitary and 
65 



A Horse's Tale 

alone, the army letting loose the grand 
yell, and she skipped from the horse 
the same as if he had been standing 
still, and made her bow, and every- 
body crowded around to congratulate, 
and they gave her the bugle, and she 
put it to her lips and blew ' boots and 
saddles ' to see how it would go, and 
BB was as proud as you can't think! 
And he said, 'Take Soldier Boy, and 
don't pass him back till I ask for 
him!' and I can tell you he wouldn't 
have said that to any other person 
on this planet. That was two months 
and more ago, and nobody has been 
on my back since but the Corporal- 
General Seventh Cavalry and Flag- 
Lieutenant of the Ninth Dragoons, 
U.S.A., — on whom be peace!" 

"Amen. I listen — tell me more." 
66 



A Horse's Tale 

" She set to work and organized the 
Sixteen, and called it the First Battal- 
ion Rocky Mountain Rangers, U.S.A., 
and she wanted to be bugler, but they 
elected her Lieutenant-Gcneral and 
Bugler. So she ranks her uncle the 
commandant, who is only a Brigadier. 
And doesn't she train those little 
people! Ask the Indians, ask the 
traders, ask the soldiers; they'll tell 
you. She has been at it from the 
first day. Every morning they go 
clattering down into the plain, and 
there she sits on my back with her 
bugle at her mouth and sounds the 
orders and puts them through the 
evolutions for an hour or more; and 
it is too beautiful for anything to see 
those ponies dissolve from one forma- 
tion into another, and waltz about, 
<>7 



A Horse's Talc 

and break, and scatter, and form again, 
always moving, always graceful, now 
trotting, now galloping, and so on, 
sometimes near by, sometimes in the 
distance, all just like a state ball, you 
know, and sometimes she can't hold 
herself any longer, but sounds the 
'charge,' and turns me loose! and you 
can take my word for it, if the battal- 
ion hasn't too much of a start we 
catch up and go over the breastworks 
with the front line. 

" Yes, they are soldiers, those little 
people; and healthy, too, not ailing 
any more, the way they used to be 
sometimes. It's because of her drill. 
She's got a fort, now — Fort Fanny 
Marsh. Major - General Tommy 
Drake planned it out, and the Seventh 
and Dragoons built it. Tommy is 
68 



A Horse's Talc 

the Colonel's son, and is fifteen and 
the oldest in the Battalion; Fanny 
Marsh is Brigadier - General, and is 
next oldest — over thirteen. She is 
daughter of Captain Marsh, Company 
B, Seventh Cavalry. Lieutenant- 
General Alison is the youngest by 
considerable ; I think she is about nine 
and a half or three-quarters. Her 
military rig, as Lieutenant-General, 
isn't for business, it's for dress parade, 
because the ladies made it. They 
say they got it out of the Middle 
Ages — out of a book — and it is all red 
and blue and white silks and satins 
and velvets; tights, trunks, sword, 
doublet with slashed sleeves, short 
cape, cap with just one feather in it; 
I've heard them name these things; 
they got them out of the book; she's 
69 



A Horse's Tale 

dressed like a page, of old times, they 
say. It's the daintiest outfit that 
ever was — you will say so, when you 
see it. She's lovely in it— oh, just a 
dream! In some ways she is just her 
age, but in others she's as old as her 
uncle, I think. She is very learned. 
She teaches her uncle his book. I 
have seen her sitting by with the 
book and reciting to him what is in 
it, so that he can learn to do it him- 
self. 

"Every Saturday she hires little 
Injuns to garrison her fort; then she 
lays siege to it, and makes military 
approaches by make-believe trenches 
in make-believe night, and finally at 
make-believe dawn she draws her 
sword and sounds the assault and 
takes it by storm. It is for practice. 
70 



A Horse's Tale 

And she has invented a bugle-call 
all by herself, out of her own head, 
and it's a stirring one, and the pret- 
tiest in the service. It's to call me 
— it's never used for anything else. 
She taught it to me, and told me 
what it says: 'It is /, Soldier — come! 1 
and when those thrilling notes come 
floating down the distance I hear 
them without fail, even if I am two 
miles away; and then — oh, then you 
should see my heels get down to 
business ! 

11 And she has taught me how to say 
good-morning and good -night to her, 
which is by lifting my right hoof for 
her to shake; and also how to say 
good-bye ; I do that with my left foot 
— but only for practice, because there 
hasn't been any but make-believe 

6 y T 



A Horse's Tale 

good-byeing yet, and I hope there 
won't ever be. It would make me 
cry if I ever had to put up my left 
foot in earnest. She has taught 
me how to salute, and I can do it as 
well as a soldier. I bow my head low, 
and lay my right hoof against my 
cheek. She taught me that because 
I got into disgrace once, through 
ignorance. I am privileged, because 
I am known to be honorable and 
trustworthy, and because I have 
a distinguished record in the ser- 
vice; so they don't hobble me nor 
tie me to stakes or shut me tight in 
stables, but let me wander around to 
suit myself. Well, trooping the colors 
is a very solemn ceremony, and every- 
body must stand uncovered when the 
flag goes by, the commandant and all ; 
72 



A Horse's Tale 

and once I was there, and ignorantly 
walked across right in front of the 
band, which was an awful disgrace. 
Ah, the Lieutenant-General was so 
ashamed, and so distressed that I 
should have done such a thing before 
all the world, that she couldn't keep 
the tears back; and then she taught 
me the salute, so that if I ever did 
any other unmilitary act through 
ignorance I could do my salute and 
she believed everybody would think 
it was apology enough and would not 
press the matter. It is very nice and 
distinguished; no other horse can do 
it; often the men salute me, and I 
return it. I am privileged to be 
present when the Rocky Mountain 
Rangers troop the colors and I stand 
solemn, like the children, and I salute 



A Horse's Tale 

when the flag goes by. Of course 
when she goes to her fort her sentries 
sing out 'Turn out the guard!' and 
then ... do you catch that refreshing 
early-morning whiff from the moun- 
tain - pines and the wild flowers ? 
The night is far spent; we'll hear the 
bugles before long. Dorcas, the black 
woman, is very good and nice; she 
takes care of the Lieutenant-General, 
and is Brigadier - General Alison's 
mother, which makes her mother-in- 
law to the Lieutenant-General. That 
is what Shekels says. At least it is 
what I think he says, though I never 
can understand him quite clearly. 
He—" 

"Who is Shekels?" 

"The Seventh Cavalry dog. I 
mean, if he is a dog. His father was 
74 



A Horse's Tale 

a coyote and his mother was a wild- 
cat. It doesn't really make a dog 
out of him, does it?" 

"Not a real dog, I should think. 
Only a kind of a general dog, at most, 
I reckon. Though this is a matter of 
ichthyology, I suppose; and if it is, 
it is out of my depth, and so my 
opinion is not valuable, and I don't 
claim much consideration for it." 

"It isn't ichthyology; it is dog- 
matics, which is still more difficult and 
tangled up. Dogmatics always are." 

" Dogmatics is quite beyond me, 
quite; so I am not competing. But 
on general principles it is my opinion 
that a colt out of a coyote and a 
wild-cat is no square dog, but doubt- 
ful. That is my hand, and I stand 
pat." 

75 



A Horse's Talc 

"Well, it is as far as I can go my- 
self, and be fair and conscientious. 
I have always regarded him as a 
doubtful dog, and so has Potter. 
Potter is the great Dane. Potter 
says he is no dog, and not even 
poultry — though I do not go quite so 
far as that." 

"And I wouldn't, myself. Poultry 
is one of those things which no person 
can get to the bottom of, there is so 
much of it and such variety. It is 
just wings, and wings, and wings, till 
you are weary: turkeys, and geese, 
and bats, and butterflies, and angels, 
and grasshoppers, and flying-fish, and 
— well, there is really no end to the 
tribe; it gives me the heaves just to 
think of it. But this one hasn't any 
wings, has he?" 

76 



A Horse's Tale 

"No." 

" Well, then, in my belief he is more 
likely to be dog than poultry. I have 
not heard of poultry that hadn't 
wings. Wings is the sign of poultry; 
it is what you tell poultry by. Look 
at the mosquito." 

" What do you reckon he is, then ? 
He must be something." 

"Why, he could be a reptile; any- 
thing that hasn't wings is a reptile." 

"Who told you that?" 

" Nobody told me, but I overheard 
it." 

"Where did you overhear it?" 

" Years ago. I was with the Phila- 
delphia Institute expedition in the 
Bad Lands under Professor Cope, 
hunting mastodon bones, and I over- 
heard him say, his own self, that any 
77 



A Horse's Tale 

plantigrade circumflex vertebrate bac- 
terium that hadn't wings and was 
uncertain was a reptile. Well, then, 
has this dog any wings ? No. Is 
he a plantigrade circumflex verte- 
brate bacterium? Maybe so, may- 
be not ; but without ever having seen 
him, and judging only by his illegal 
and spectacular parentage, I will bet 
the odds of a bale of hay to a bran 
mash that he looks it. Finally, is 
he uncertain ? That is the point — is 
he uncertain? I will leave it to you 
if you have ever heard of a more un- 
certainer dog than what this one is ?" 

"No, I never have." 

"Well, then, he's a reptile. That's 
settled." 

"Why, look here, whatsyour- 
name — " 

78 



A Horse's Tale 

"Last alias, Mongrel." 

"A good one, too. I was going to 
say, you arc better educated than 
you have been pretending to be, 1 
like cultured society, and 1 shall 
cultivate your acquaintance. Now 
as to Shekels, whenever you want to 

know about any private thing that 
is going on at this post or in White 
Cloud's ramp or Thunder-Bird's, he 
can tell you; and if you make friends 
with him he'll he glad to, lor he 
is a horn gossip, and picks np all 
the tittle-tattle. Being the whole 
Seventh Cavalry's reptile, he doesn't 
belong to anybody in particular, and 
hasn't any military duties ; so he comes 
and goes as he pleases, and is popular 
with all the house cats and other 
authentic sources of private informa- 
79 



A Horse's Tale 

tion. He understands all the lan- 
guages, and talks them all, too. With 
an accent like gritting your teeth, it is 
true, and with a grammar that is no 
improvement on blasphemy — still, 
with practice you get at the meat of 
what he says, and it serves. . . . Hark! 
That's the reveille. . . . 



Quick. 



THE REVEILLE * 




♦ At West Point the bugle is supposed to be saying : 
" I can't get 'em up, 
I can't get 'em up, 
I can't get 'em up in the morning I " 

80 



A Horse's Tale 



"Faint and far, but isn't it clear, 
isn't it sweet? There's no music 
like the bugle to stir the blood, in the 
still solemnity of the morning twilight, 
with the dim plain stretching away to 
nothing and the spectral mountains 
slumbering against the sky. You'll 
hear another note in a minute — 
faint and far and clear, like the other 
one, and sweeter still, you'll notice. 
Wait . . . listen. There it goes! It 
says, ' It is I, Soldier — come!' . . . 
SOLDIER BOY'S BUGLE CALL 

m 




. . . Now then, watch me leave a blue 
streak behind!" 



VII 



SOLDIER BOY AND SHEKELS 




ID you do as I told 
you ? Did you look up 
the Mexican Plug?" 
" Yes, I made his ac- 
quaintance before night and got his 
friendship." 

"I liked him. Did you?" 
"Not at first. He took me for a 
reptile, and it troubled me, because 
I didn't know whether it was a 
compliment or not. I couldn't ask 
him, because it would look ignorant. 
So I didn't say anything, and soon I 
82 



A Horse's Talc 

liked him very well indeed. Was it 
a compliment, do you think?" 

"Yes, that is what it was. They 
are very rare, the reptiles; very few 
left, now-a-days." 

"Is that so? What is a reptile?" 

"It is a plantigrade circumflex 
vertebrate bacterium that hasn't any 
wings and is uncertain." 

"Well, it — it sounds fine, it surely 
does." 

"And it is fine. You may be 
thankful you are one." 

"I am. It seems wonderfully 
grand and elegant for a person that is 
so humble as I am ; but I am thankful, 
I am indeed, and will try to live up 
to it. It is hard to remember. Will 
you say it again, please, and say it 
slow?" 

83 



A Horse's Tale 

" Plantigrade circumflex vertebrate 
bacterium that hasn't any wings and 
is uncertain." 

"It is beautiful, anybody must 
grant it; beautiful, and of a noble 
sound. I hope it will not make me 
proud and stuck-up — I should not 
like to be that. It is much more dis- 
tinguished and honorable to be a 
reptile than a dog, don't you think, 
Soldier?" 

"Why, there's no comparison. It 
is awfully aristocratic. Often a duke 
is called a reptile ; it is set down so, in 
history." 

" Isn't that grand ! Potter wouldn't 
ever associate with me, but I reckon 
he'll be glad to when he finds out 
what I am." 

"You can depend upon it." 

8 4 



A Horse's Tale 

11 1 will thank Mongrel for this. He 
is a very good sort, for a Mexican 
Plug. Don't you think he is?" 

" It is my opinion of him ; and as for 
his birth, he cannot help that. We 
cannot all be reptiles, we cannot all 
be fossils ; we have to take what comes 
and be thankful it is no worse. It is 
the true philosophy." 

"For those others?" 

" Stick to the subject, please. Did 
it turn out that my suspicions were 
right?" 

" Yes, perfectly right. Mongrel has 
heard them planning. They are after 
BB's life, for running them out of 
Medicine Bow and taking their stolen 
horses away from them." 

"Well, they'll get him yet, for 
sure." 

85 



A Horse's Tale 

"Not if he keeps a sharp look- 
out." 

11 He keep a sharp lookout! He 
never does ; he despises them, and all 
their kind. His life is always being 
threatened, and so it has come to be 
monotonous." 

"Does he know they are here?" 

"Oh yes, he knows it. He is al- 
ways the earliest to know who comes 
and who goes. But he cares nothing 
for them and their threats; he only 
laughs when people warn him. They'll 
shoot him from behind a tree the first 
he knows. Did Mongrel tell you 
their plans?" 

"Yes. They have found out that 

he starts for Fort Clayton day after 

to-morrow, with one of his scouts ; so 

they will leave to-morrow, letting on 

86 



A Horse's Tale 

to go south, but they will fetch around 
north all in good time." 

" Shekels, I don't like the look of 
it." 




VIII 

THE SCOUT-START. BB AND LIEUTEN- 
ANT-GENERAL ALISON 

iB {saluting). "Good! 
handsomely done! The 
Seventh couldn't beat it! 
You do certainly handle 
your Rangers like an expert, General. 
And where are you bound ?" 

"Four miles on the trail to Fort 
Clayton." 

"Glad am I, dear! What's the 
idea of it?" 

"Guard of honor for you and 
Thorndike." 

88 



A Horse's Talc 

' ' Bless — your — heart ! I 'd rather 
have it from you than from the Com- 
mander-in-Chief of the armies of the 
United States, you incomparable little 
soldier! — and I don't need to take any 
oath to that, for you to believe it." 
"I thought you'd like it, BB." 
"Like it? Well, I should say so! 
Now then — all ready — sound the ad- 
vance, and away we go!" 




IX 

SOLDIER BOY AND SHEKELS AGAIN 

f ELL, this is the way it 
happened. We did the 
escort duty; then we 
came back and struck 
for the plain and put the Rangers 
through a rousing drill — oh, for hours ! 
Then we sent them home under Brig- 
adier-General Fanny Marsh ; then the 
Lieutenant-General and I went off on 
a gallop over the plains for about three 
hours, and were lazying along home 
in the middle of the afternoon, when 
we met Jimmy Slade, the drummer - 
90 



A Horse's Tale 

boy, and he saluted and asked the 
Lieutenant-General if she had heard 
the news, and she said no, and he 
said: 

"'Buffalo Bill has been ambushed 
and badly shot this side of Clayton, 
and Thorndike the scout, too; Bill 
couldn't travel, but Thorndike could, 
and he brought the news, and Sergeant 
Wilkes and six men of Company B are 
gone, two hours ago, hotfoot, to get 
Bill. And they say— J 

" l Go! y she shouts to me — and I 
went." 

"Fast?" 

" Don't ask foolish questions. It 
was an awful pace. For four hours 
nothing happened, and not a word 
said, except that now and then she 
said, 'Keep it up, Boy, keep it up, 

9i 



A Horse's Talc 

sweetheart; we'll save him!' I kept 
it up. Well, when the dark shut 
down, in the rugged hills, that poor 
little chap had been tearing around in 
the saddle all day, and I noticed by 
the slack knee-pressure that she was 
tired and tottery, and I got dreadfully 
afraid ; but every time I tried to slow 
down and let her go to sleep, so I 
could stop, she hurried me up again; 
and so, sure enough, at last over she 
went! 

"Ah, that was a fix to be in! for 
she lay there and didn't stir, and 
what was I to do ? I couldn't leave 
her to fetch help, on account of the 
wolves. There was nothing to do but 
stand by. It was dreadful. I was 
afraid she was killed, poor little 
thing! But she wasn't. She came 
92 



A Horse's Tale 

to, by-and-by, and said, 'Kiss me, 
Soldier,' and those were blessed words. 
I kissed her — often ; I am used to that, 
and we like it. But she didn't get 
up, and I was worried. She fondled 
my nose with her hand, and talked to 
me, and called me endearing names — 
which is her way — but she caressed 
with the same hand all the time. The 
other arm was broken, you see, but I 
didn't know it, and she didn't men- 
tion it. She didn't want to distress 
me, you know. 

"Soon the big gray wolves came, 
and hung around, and you could hear 
them snarl, and snap at each other, 
but you couldn't see anything of 
them except their eyes, which shone 
in the dark like sparks and stars. The 
Lieutenant-General said, 'If I had 
93 



A Horse's Talc 

the Rocky Mountain Rangers here, 
we would make those creatures climb 
a tree.' Then she made believe that 
the Rangers were in hearing, and put 
up her bugle and blew the ' assembly ' ; 
and then, 'boots and saddles'; then 
the 'trot'; 'gallop'; 'charge!' Then 
she blew the 'retreat,' and said, 
'That's for you, you rebels; the 
Rangers don't ever retreat!' 

" The music frightened them away, 
but they were hungry, and kept com- 
ing back. And of course they got 
bolder and bolder, which is their way. 
It went on for an hour, then the tired 
child went to sleep, and it was pitiful 
to hear her moan and nestle, and I 
couldn't do anything for her. All the 
time I was laying for the wolves. 
They are in my line; I have had ex- 
94 



A Horse's Tale 

perience. At last the boldest one 
ventured within my lines, and I 
landed him among his friends with 
some of his skull still on him, and they 
did the rest. In the next hour I got 
a couple more, and they went the way 
of the first one, down the throats of 
the detachment. That satisfied the 
survivors, and they went away and 
left us in peace. 

"We hadn't any more adventures, 
though I kept awake all night and was 
ready. From midnight on the child 
got very restless, and out of her head, 
and moaned, and said, 'Water, water 
— thirsty'; and now and then, 'Kiss 
me, Soldier ' ; and sometimes she was 
in her fort and giving orders to her 
garrison; and once she was in Spain, 
and thought her mother was with her. 
95 



A Horse's Tale 

People say a horse can't cry; but 
they don't know, because we cry 
inside. 

" It was an hour after sunup that 
I heard the boys coming, and rec- 
ognized the hoof-beats of Pomp and 
Caesar and Jerry, old mates of mine; 
and a welcomer sound there couldn't 
ever be. 

Buffalo Bill was in a horse-litter, 
with his leg broken by a bullet, and 
Mongrel and Blake Haskins's horse 
were doing the work. Buffalo Bill 
and Thorndike had killed both of 
those toughs. 

"When they got to us, and Buffalo 
Bill saw the child lying there so white, 
he said, 'My God!' and the sound of 
his voice brought her to herself, and 
she gave a little cry of pleasure and 
96 



A Horse's Tale 

struggled to get up, but couldn't, and 
the soldiers gathered her up like the 
tenderest women, and their eyes were 
wet and they were not ashamed, 
when they saw her arm dangling ; and 
so were Buffalo Bill's, and when they 
laid her in his arms he said, ' My dar- 
ling, how does this come?' and she 
said, 'We came to save you, but I 
was tired, and couldn't keep awake, 
and fell off and hurt myself, and 
couldn't get on again.' 'You came 
to save me, you dear little rat? It 
was too lovely of you!' 'Yes, and 
Soldier stood by me, which you know 
he would, and protected me from the 
wolves; and if he got a chance he 
kicked the life out of some of them — 
for you know he would, BB.' The 
sergeant said, 'He laid out three of 
97 



A Horse's Tale 

them, sir, and here's the bones to 
show for it.' 'He's a grand horse,' 
said BB ; * he's the grandest horse that 
ever was! and has saved your life, 
Lieutenant-General Alison, and shall 
protect it the rest of his life — he's 
yours for a kiss!' He got it, along 
with a passion of delight, and he said, 
'You are feeling better now, little 
Spaniard — do you think you could 
blow the advance ?' She put up the 
bugle to do it, but he said wait a min- 
ute first. Then he and the sergeant 
set her arm and put it in splints, she 
wincing but not whimpering ; then we 
took up the march for home, and 
that's the end of the tale; and I'm 
her horse. Isn't she a brick, She- 
kels? 

" Brick ? She's more than a brick, 
98 



A Horse's Tale 

more than a thousand bricks — she's 
a reptile!" 

"It's a compliment out of your 
heart, Shekels. God bless you for 
it!" 



X 




GENERAL ALISON AND DORCAS 

)00 much company for 
her, Marse Tom. Be- 
twixt you, and Shekels, 
and the Colonel's wife, 
and the Cid— " 

"The Cid? Oh, I remember— the 
raven." 

" — and Mrs. Captain Marsh and 
Famine and Pestilence the baby 
coyotes, and Sour-Mash and her pups, 
and Sardanapalus and her kittens — 
hang these names she gives the creat- 
ures, they warp my jaw — and Potter : 



ioo 



A Horse's Tale 

you — all sitting around in the house, 
and Soldier Boy at the window the 
entire time, it's a wonder to me she 
comes along as well as she does. 
She—" 

" You want her all to yourself, you 
stingy old thing!" 

"Marse Tom, you know better. 
It's too much company. And then 
the idea of her receiving reports all 
the time from her officers, and acting 
upon them, and giving orders, the 
same as if she was well ! It ain't good 
for her, and the surgeon don't like it, 
and tried to persuade her not to and 
couldn't; and when he ordered her, 
she was that outraged and indignant, 
and was very severe on him, and 
accused him of insubordination, and 
said it didn't become him to give 

IOI 



A Horse's Tale 

orders to an officer of her rank. Well, 
he saw he had excited her more and 
done more harm than all the rest put 
together, so he was vexed at himself 
and wished he had kept still. Doctors 
don't know much, and that's a fact. 
She's too much interested in things — 
she ought to rest more. She's all the 
time sending messages to BB, and to 
soldiers and Injuns and whatnot, and 
to the animals." 

"To the animals?" 

"Yes, sir." 

"Who carries them?" 

" Sometimes Potter, but mostly it's 
Shekels." 

" Now come ! who can find fault with 
such pretty make-believe as that?" 

" But it ain't make-believe, Marse 
Tom. She does send them." 



A Horse's Tale 

"Yes, I don't doubt that part of 
it." 

"Do you doubt they get them, 
sir?" 

"Certainly. Don't you?" 
"No, sir. Animals talk to one 
another. I know it perfectly weH 
Marse Tom, and I ain't saying it by 
guess." 

"What a curious superstition!" 
" It ain't a superstition, Marse Tom. 
Look at that Shekels — look at him, 
now. Is he listening, or ain't he? 
Now you see! he's turned his head 
away. It's because he was caught — 
caught in the act. I'll ask you — 
could a Christian look any more 
ashamed than what he looks now?— 
lay down! You see ? he was going to 
sneak out. Don't tell me, Marse 
s 103 



A Horse's Tale 

Tom! If animals don't talk, I miss 
my guess. And Shekels is the worst. 
He goes and tells the animals every- 
thing that happens in the officers' 
quarters ; and if he's short of facts, he 
invents them. He hasn't any more 
principle than a blue jay; and as for 
morals, he's empty. Look at him 
now; look at him grovel. He knows 
what I am saying, and he knows it's 
the truth. You see, yourself, that he 
can feel shame; it's the only virtue 
he's got. It's wonderful how they 
find out everything that's going on 
— the animals. They — " 

"Do you really believe they do, 
Dorcas?" 

" I don't only just believe it, Marse 
Tom, I know it. Day before yester- 
day they knew something was going 
104 



A Horse's Tale 

to happen. They were that excited, 
and whispering around together ; why, 
anybody could see that they — But 
my! I must get back to her, and I 
haven't got to my errand yet." 

"What is it, Dorcas ?" 

" Well, it's two or three things. One 
is, the doctor don't salute when he 
comes . . . Now, Marse Tom, it ain't 
anything to laugh at, and so — " 

"Well, then, forgive me; I didn't 
mean to laugh — I got caught un- 
prepared." 

"You see, she don't want to hurt 
the doctor's feelings, so she don't say 
anything to him about it; but she is 
always polite, herself, and it hurts 
that kind for people to be rude to 
them." 

"I'll have that doctor hanged." 
105 



A Horse's Tale 

"Marse Tom, she don't want him 
hanged. She—" 

"Well, then, I'll have him boiled in 
oil." 

"But she don't want him boiled. 
I— " 

"0h ; very well, very well, I only 
want to please her; I'll have him 
skinned." 

" Why, she don't want him skinned ; 
it would break her heart. Now — " 

"Woman, this is perfectly unrea- 
sonable. What in the nation does 
she want?" 

" Marse Tom, if you would only be 
a little patient, and not fly off the 
handle at the least little thing. Why, 
she only wants you to speak to 
him." 

"Speak to him! Well, upon my 
106 



A Horse's Talc 

word! All this unseemly rage and 
row about such a — a — Dorcas, I 
never saw you carry on like this be- 
fore. You have alarmed the sentry; 
he thinks I am being assassinated; 
he thinks there's a mutiny, a revolt, 
an insurrection; he — " 

"Marse Tom, you are just putting 
on; you know it perfectly well; / 
don't know what makes you act like 
that — but you always did, even when 
you was little, and you can't get over 
it, I reckon. Are you over it now, 
Marse Tom?" 

"Oh, well, yes; but it would try 
anybody to be doing the best he could, 
offering every kindness he could think 
of, only to have it rejected with con- 
tumely and . . . Oh, well, let it go; 
it's no matter— I'll talk to the doctor. 
107 



A Horse's Tale 

Is that satisfactory, or are you going 
to break out again?" 

"Yes, sir, it is; and it's only right 
to talk to him, too, because it's just 
as she says; she's trying to keep up 
discipline in the Rangers, and this 
insubordination of his is a bad ex- 
ample for them — now ain't it so, 
Marse Tom?" 

" Well, there is reason in it, I can't 
deny it ; so I will speak to him, though 
at bottom I think hanging would be 
more lasting. What is the rest of 
your errand, Dorcas ?" 

"Of course her room is Ranger 
headquarters now, Marse Tom, while 
she's sick. Well, soldiers of the 
cavalry and the dragoons that are 
off duty come and get her sentries to 
let them relieve them and serve in 
1 08 



A Horse's Talc 

their place. It's only out of affec- 
tion, sir, and because they know mil- 
itary honors please her, and please 
the children too, for her sake; and 
they don't bring their muskets ; and 
so—" 

"I've noticed them there, but didn't 
twig the idea. They are standing 
guard, are they?" 

" Yes, sir, and she is afraid you will 
reprove them and hurt their feelings, 
if you see them there ; so she begs, if 
— if you don't mind coming in the 
back way — " 

" Bear me up, Dorcas ; don't let me 
faint." 

" There — sit up and behave, Marse 

Tom. You are not going to faint; 

you are only pretending — you used 

to act just so when you was little; 

109 



A Horse's Tale 

it does seem a long time for you to get 
grown tip." 

" Dorcas, the way the child is pro- 
gressing, I shall be out of my job 
before long — she'll have the whole 
post in her hands. I must make a 
stand, I must not go down without a 
struggle. These encroachments. . . . 
Dorcas, what do you think she will 
think of next?" 

"Marse Tom, she don't mean any 
harm." 

" Are you sure of it ?" 

"Yes, Marse Tom." 

"You feel sure she has no ulterior 
designs?" 

"I don't know what that is, 
Marse Tom, but I know she 
hasn't." 

" Very well, then, for the present I 
no 



A Horse's Tale 

am satisfied. What else have you 
come about?" 

"I reckon I better tell you the 
whole thing first, Marse Tom, then 
tell you what she wants. There's 
been an emeute, as she calls it. It 
was before she got back with BB. 
The officer of the day reported it to 
her this morning. It happened at 
her fort. There was a fuss betwixt 
Major-General Tommy Drake and 
Lieutenant-Colonel Agnes Frisbie, and 
he snatched her doll away, which is 
made of white kid stuffed with saw- 
dust, and tore every rag of its clothes 
off, right before them all, and is under 
arrest, and the charge is conduct 
un— " 

"Yes, I know — conduct unbecom- 
ing an officer and a gentleman — a 
in 



A Horse's Tale 

plain case, too, it seems to me. This 
is a serious matter. Well, what is her 
pleasure?" 

"Well, Marse Tom, she has sum- 
moned a court-martial, but the doc- 
tor don't think she is well enough to 
preside over it, and she says there 
ain't anybody competent but her, 
because there's a major-general con- 
cerned; and so she — she — well, she 
says, would you preside over it for 
her? . . . Marse Tom, sit up! You 
ain't any more going to faint than 
Shekels is." 

" Look here, Dorcas, go along back, 
and be tactful. Be persuasive ; don't 
fret her; tell her it's all right, the 
matter is in my hands, but it isn't 
good form to hurry so grave a matter 
as this. Explain to her that we have 

112 



A Horse's Tale 

to go by precedents, and that I be- 
lieve this one to be new. In fact, 
you can say I know that nothing 
just like it has happened in our 
army, therefore I must be guided by 
European precedents, and must go 
cautiously and examine them care- 
fully. Tell her not to be impatient, 
it will take me several days, but it 
will all come out right, and I will come 
over and report progress as I go along. 
Do you get the idea, Dorcas?" 
"X don't know as I do, sir." 
"Well, it's this. You see, it won't 
ever do for me, a brigadier in the 
regular army, to preside over that 
infant court-martial — there isn't any 
precedent for it, don't you see. Very 
well. I will go on examining au- 
thorities and reporting progress until 
n 3 



A Horse's Tale 

she is well enough to get me out of this 
scrape by presiding herself. Do you 
get it now?" 

" Oh, yes, sir, I get it, and it's good, 
I'll go and fix it with her. Lay down! 
and stay where you are." 

"Why, what harm is he doing?" 

" Oh, it ain't any harm, but it just 
vexes me to see him act so." 

"What was he doing?" 

11 Can't you see, and him in such a 
sweat ? He was starting out to spread 
it all over the post. Now I reckon 
you won't deny, any more, that they 
go and tell everything they hear, now 
that you've seen it with yo' own 
eyes." 

"Well, I don't like to acknowledge 
it, Dorcas, but I don't see how I can 
consistently stick to my doubts in the 
114 



A Horse's Talc 

face of such overwhelming proof as 
this dog is furnishing." 

" There, now, you've got in yo' 
right mind at last! I wonder you 
can be so stubborn, Marse Tom. But 
you always was, even when you was 
little. I'm going now." 

"Look here; tell her that in view 
of the delay, it is my judgment that 
she ought to enlarge the accused on 
his parole." 

" Yes, sir, I '11 tell her. Marse Tom ?" 

"Well?" 

" She can't get to Soldier Boy, and 
he stands there all the time, down in 
the mouth and lonesome ; and she says 
will you shake hands with him and 
comfort him? Everybody does." 

"It's a curious kind of lonesome- 
ness; but, all right, I will." 
115 



XI 



SEVERAL MONTHS LATER. ANTONIO 
AND THORNDIKE 




'HORNDIKE, isn't that 
Plug you're riding an 
asset of the scrap you 
and Buffalo Bill had 
with the late Blake Haskins and his 
pal a few months back?" 

"Yes, this is Mongrel — and not a 
half -bad horse, either." 

"I've noticed he keeps up his lick 
first-rate. Say — isn't it a gaudy 
morning?" 

"Right you are!" 
116 



A Horse's Talc 

"Thorndike, it's Andalusian! and 
when that's said, all's said." 

"Andalusian and Oregonian, An- 
tonio! Put it that way, and you 
have my vote. Being a native up 
there, I know. You being Andalu- 
sian-born — " 

" Can speak with authority for that 
patch of paradise ? Well, I can. Like 
the Don! like Sancho! This is the 
correct Andalusian dawn now — crisp, 
fresh, dewy, fragrant, pungent — " 

" ' What though the spicy breezes 
Blow soft o'er Ceylon's isle — ' 

— git up, you old cow! stumbling like 
that when we've just been praising 
you! out on a scout and can't live up 
to the honor any better than that? 
Antonio, how long have you been 
117 



A Horse's Tale 

out here in the Plains and the Rock- 
ies?" 

"More than thirteen years." 

" It's a long time. Don't you ever 
get homesick?" 

"Not till now." 

"Why now? — after such a long 
cure." 

"These preparations of the retir- 
ing commandant's have started it 
up." 

"Of course. It's natural." 

"It keeps me thinking about Spain. 
I know the region where the Seventh's 
child's aunt lives; I know all the 
lovely country for miles around; I'll 
bet I've seen her aunt's villa many a 
time; I'll bet I've been in it in those 
pleasant old times when I was a 
Spanish gentleman." 
118 



A Horse's Tale 

"They say the child is wild to see 
Spain." 

" It's so ; I know it from what I hear. ' ' 

"Haven't you talked with her 
about it?" 

"No. I've avoided it. I should 
soon be as wild as she is. That 
would not be comfortable." 

"I wish I was going, Antonio. 
There's two things I'd give a lot to 
see. One's a railroad." 

"She'll see one when she strikes 
Missouri." 

"The other's a bull-fight." 

"I've seen lots of them; I wish I 
could see another. 

"I don't know anything about it, 
except in a mixed-up, foggy way, 
Antonio, but I know enough to know 
it's grand sport." 
9 119 



A Horse's Tale 

1 ' The grandest in the world ! There's 
no other sport that begins with it. 
I'll tell you what I've seen, then you 
can judge. It was my first, and it's 
as vivid to me now as it was when I 
saw it. It was a Sunday afternoon, 
and beautiful weather, and my uncle, 
the priest, took me as a reward for 
being a good boy and because of my 
own accord and without anybody ask- 
ing me I had bankrupted my savings- 
box and given the money to a mission 
that was civilizing the Chinese and 
sweetening their lives and softening 
their hearts with the gentle teachings 
of our religion, and I wish you could 
have seen what we saw that day, 
Thorndike. 

"The amphitheatre was packed, 
from the bull-ring to the highest row 
120 



A Horse's Tale 

— twelve thousand people in one cir- 
cling mass, one slanting, solid mass 
— royalties, nobles, clergy, ladies, 
gentlemen, state officials, generals, 
admirals, soldiers, sailors, lawyers, 
thieves, merchants, brokers, cooks, 
housemaids, scullery-maids, doubt- 
ful women, dudes, gamblers, beggars, 
loafers, tramps, American ladies, gen- 
tlemen, preachers, English ladies, 
gentlemen, preachers, German ditto, 
French ditto, and so on and so on, 
all the world represented: Spaniards 
to admire and praise, foreigners to 
enjoy and go home and find fault — 
there they were, one solid, sloping, 
circling sweep of rippling and flash- 
ing color under the downpour of the 
summer sun — just a garden, a gaudy, 
gorgeous flower - garden ! Children 

121 



A Horse's Tale 

munching oranges, six thousand fans 
fluttering and glimmering, everybody 
happy, everybody chatting gayly with 
their intimates, lovely girl-faces smil- 
ing recognition and salutation to 
other lovely girl-faces, gray old ladies 
and gentlemen dealing in the like 
exchanges with each other — ah, such 
a picture of cheery contentment and 
glad anticipation! not a mean spirit, 
nor a sordid soul, nor a sad heart there 
— ah, Thorndike, I wish I could see it 
again. 

"Suddenly, the martial note of a 
bugle cleaves the hum and murmur — 
clear the ring! 

"They clear it. The great gate is 
flung open, and the procession 
marches in, splendidly costumed and 
glittering: the marshals of the day, 

122 



A Horse's Tale 

then the picadores on horseback, 
then the matadores on foot, each 
surrounded by his quadrille of chulos. 
They march to the box of the city 
fathers, and formally salute. The 
key is thrown, the bull-gate is un- 
locked. Another bugle blast — the 
gate flies open, the bull plunges in, 
furious, trembling, blinking in the 
blinding light, and stands there, a 
magnificent creature, centre of those 
multitudinous and admiring eyes, 
brave, ready for battle, his attitude a 
challenge. He sees his enemy: horse- 
men sitting motionless, with long 
spears in rest, upon blindfolded bro- 
ken-down nags, lean and starved, 
fit only for sport and sacrifice, then 
the carrion-heap. 

"The bull makes a rush, with 
123 



A Horse's Tale 

murder in his eye, but a picador 
meets him with a spear-thrust in the 
shoulder. He flinches with the pain, 
and the picador skips out of danger. 
A burst of applause for the picador, 
hisses for the bull. Some shout 
'Cow!' at the bull, and call him of- 
fensive names. But he is not lis- 
tening to them, he is there for busi- 
ness; he is not minding the cloak- 
bearers that come fluttering around 
to confuse him; he chases this way, 
he chases that way, and hither and 
yon, scattering the nimble banderillos 
in every direction like a spray, and 
receiving their maddening darts in 
his neck as they dodge and fly — oh, 
but it's a lively spectacle, and brings 
down the house! Ah, you should 
hear the thundering roar that goes up 
124 



A Horse's Tale 

when the game is at its wildest and 
brilliant things are done! 

" Oh, that first bull, that day, was 
great! From the moment the spirit 
of war rose to flood-tide in him and 
he got down to his work, he began to 
do wonders. He tore his way through 
his persecutors, flinging one of them 
clear over the parapet ; he bowled a 
horse and his rider down, and plunged 
straight for the next, got home with 
his horns, wounding both horse and 
man ; on again, here and there and this 
way and that; and one after another 
he tore the bowels out of two horses 
so that they gushed to the ground, 
and ripped a third one so badly that 
although they rushed him to cover 
and shoved his bowels back and 
stuffed the rents with tow and rode 
125 



A Horse's Tale 

him against the bull again, he couldn't 
make the trip; he tried to gallop, 
under the spur, but soon reeled and 
tottered and fell, all in a heap. For 
a while, that bull-ring was the most 
thrilling and glorious and inspiring 
sight that ever was seen. The bull 
absolutely cleared it, and stood there 
alone! monarch of the place. The 
people went mad for pride in him, and 
joy and delight, and you couldn't hear 
yourself think, for the roar and boom 
and crash of applause." 

"Antonio, it carries me clear out of 
myself just to hear you tell it ; it must 
have been perfectly splendid. If I 
live, I'll see a bull-fight yet before I 
die. Did they kill him ?" 

"Oh yes; that is what the bull is 
for. They tired him out, and got him 
126 



A Horse's Tale 

at last. He kept rushing the mata- 
dor, who always slipped smartly and 
gracefully aside in time, waiting for 
a sure chance ; and at last it came ; the 
bull made a deadly plunge for him — 
was avoided neatly, and as he sped 
by, the long sword glided silently 
into him, between left shoulder and 
spine — in and in, to the hilt. He 
crumpled down, dying." 

" Ah, Antonio, it is the noblest sport 
that ever was. I would give a year 
of my life to see it. Is the bull al- 
ways killed?" 

"Yes. Sometimes a bull is timid, 
finding himself in so strange a place, 
and he stands trembling, or tries to 
retreat. Then everybody despises 
him for his cowardice and wants him 
punished and made ridiculous; so 
127 



A Horse's Tale 

they hough him from behind, and it 
is the funniest thing in the world to 
see him hobbling around on his 
severed legs; the whole vast house 
goes into hurricanes of laughter over 
it; I have laughed till the tears ran 
down my cheeks to see it. When he 
has furnished all the sport he can, he 
is not any longer useful, and is killed." 
"Well, it is perfectly grand, An- 
tonio, perfectly beautiful. Burning 
a nigger don't begin." 



XII 



MONGREL AND THE OTHER HORSE 




(AGE-BRUSH, you have 
been listening?" 
"Yes." 

"Isn't it strange?" 
"Well, no, Mongrel, I don't know 
that it is." 

"Why don't you?" 
"I've seen a good many human 
beings in my time. They are created 
as they are; they cannot help it. 
They are only brutal because that is 
their make ; brutes would be brutal if 
it was their make." 
129 



A Horse's Tale 

"To me, Sage-Brush, man is most 
strange and unaccountable. Why 
should he treat dumb animals that 
way when they are not doing any 
harm?" 

" Man is not always like that, Mon- 
grel ; he is kind enough when he is not 
excited by religion." 

"Is the bull-fight a religious ser- 
vice?" 

" I think so. I have heard so. It 
is held on Sunday." 

(A reflective pause, lasting some mo- 
ments.) Then: 

"When we die, Sage-Brush, do we 
go to heaven and dwell with man?" 

"My father thought not. He be- 
lieved we do not have to go there un- 
less we deserve it." 



Part II 

IN SPAIN 




XIII 

GENERAL ALISON TO HIS MOTHER 

T was a prodigious trip ( 
but delightful, of course, 
through the Rockies and 
the Black Hills and the 
mighty sweep of the Great Plains to 
civilization and the Missouri border — 
where the railroading began and the 
delightfulness ended. But no one is 
the worse for the journey; certainly 
not Cathy, nor Dorcas, nor Soldier 
Boy; and as for me, I am not com- 
plaining. 

Spain is all that Cathy had pictured 
i33 



A Horse's Tale 

it — and more, she says. She is in a 
fury of delight, the maddest little 
animal that ever was, and all for joy. 
She thinks she remembers Spain, but 
that is not very likely, I suppose. 
The two — Mercedes and Cathy — de- 
vour each other. It is a rapture of 
love, and beautiful to see. It is 
Spanish; that describes it. Will this 
be a short visit ? 

No. It will be permanent. Cathy 
has elected to abide with Spain and 
her aunt. Dorcas says she (Dorcas) 
foresaw that this would happen; and 
also says that she wanted it to hap- 
pen, and says the child's own coun- 
try is the right place for her, and that 
she ought not to have been sent to 
me, I ought to have gone to her. I 
thought it insane to take Soldier Boy 
i34 



A Horse's Tale 

to Spain, but it was well that I 
yielded to Cathy's pleadings; if he 
had been left behind, half of her heart 
would have remained with him, and 
she would not have been contented. 
As it is, everything has fallen out for 
the best, and we are all satisfied and 
comfortable. It may be that Dorcas 
and I will see America again some 
day; but also it is a case of maybe 
not. 

We left the post in the early morn- 
ing. It was an affecting time. The 
women cried over Cathy, so did even 
those stern warriors the Rocky Moun- 
tain Rangers; Shekels was there, and 
the Cid, and Sardanapalus, and Pot- 
ter, and Mongrel, and Sour -Mash, 
Famine, and Pestilence, and Cathy 
kissed them all and wept; details of 
i35 



A Horse's Tale 

the several arms of the garrison were 
present to represent the rest, and say- 
good-bye and God bless you for all the 
soldiery; and there was a special 
squad from the Seventh, with the 
oldest veteran at its head, to speed 
the Seventh's Child with grand honors 
and impressive ceremonies; and the 
veteran had a touching speech by 
heart, and put up his hand in salute 
and tried to say it, but his lips trem- 
bled and his voice broke, but Cathy 
bent down from the saddle and kissed 
him on the mouth and turned his 
defeat to victory, and a cheer went 
up. 

The next act closed the ceremonies, 

and was a moving surprise. It may 

be that you have discovered, before 

this, that the rigors of military law 

136 



A Horse's Tale 

and custom melt insensibly away and 
disappear when a soldier or a regi- 
ment or the garrison wants to do 
something that will please Cathy. 
The bands conceived the idea of 
stirring her soldierly heart with a 
farewell which would remain in her 
memory always, beautiful and un- 
fading, and bring back the past and 
its love for her whenever she should 
think of it; so they got their project 
placed before General Burnaby, my 
successor, who is Cathy's newest 
slave, and in spite of poverty of 
precedents they got his permission. 
The bands knew the child's favorite 
military airs. By this hint you know 
what is coming, but Cathy didn't. 
She was asked to sound the " re- 
veille," which she did. 
i37 



A Horse's Talc 

REVEILLE 



Quick. 




With the last note the bands burst 
out with a crash : and woke the moun- 
tains with the "Star-Spangled Ban- 
ner " in a way to make a body's heart 
swell and thump and his hair rise! 
It was enough to break a person all 
up, to see Cathy's radiant face shining 
out through her gladness and tears. 
By request she blew the "assembly," 
now. . . . 

138 



A Horse's Tale 

THE ASSEMBLY 



Moderate. 




. . . Then the bands thundered in, 
with "Rally round the flag, boys, 
rally once again!" Next, she blew 
another call ("to the Standard") . . . 

TO THE STANDARD 

Quick time. 




A Horse's Talc 




. . . and the bands responded with 
"When we were marching through 
Georgia." Straightway she sounded 
"boots and saddles," that thrilling 
and most expediting call. . . . 



Quick. 



BOOTS AND SADDLES 



. . . and the bands could hardly 
hold in for the final note; then they 
turned their whole strength loose on 
"Tramp, tramp, tramp, the boys are 
marching," and everybody's excite- 
ment rose to blood-heat. 

Now an impressive pause — then 
140 



A Horse's Tale 

the bugle sang "Taps" — translatable, 
■this time, into " Good-bye, and God 
keep us all!" for taps is the soldier's 
nightly release from duty, and fare- 
well: plaintive, sweet, pathetic, for 
the morning is never sure, for him; 
always it is possible that he is hearing 
it for the last time. . . . 



TAPS 



Slow, ns 




. . . Then the bands turned their in- 
struments towards Cathy and burst in 
with that rollicking frenzy of a tune, 
"Oh, we'll all get blind drunk when 
johnny comes marching home — yes, 
we'll all get blind drunk when Johnny 
141 



A Horse's Tale 

comes marching home!" and followed 
it instantly with "Dixie," that anti- 
dote for melancholy, merriest and 
gladdest of all military music on any 
side of the ocean — and that was the 
end. And so — farewell! 

I wish you could have been there to 
see it all, hear it all, and feel it: and 
get yourself blown away with the 
hurricane huzza that swept the place 
as a finish. 

When we rode away, our main 
body had already been on the road 
an hour or two — I speak of our camp 
equipage; but we didn't move off 
alone: when Cathy blew the "ad- 
vance" the Rangers cantered out in 
column of fours, and gave us escort, 
and were joined by White Cloud and 
Thunder - Bird in all their gaudy 
142 



A Horse's Tale 

bravery, and by Buffalo Bill and four 
subordinate scouts. Three miles 
away, in the Plains, the Lieutenant- 
General halted, sat her horse like a 
military statue, the bugle at her lips, 
and put the Rangers through the 
evolutions for half an hour; and 
finally, when she blew the "charge," 
she led it herself. "Not for the 
last time," she said, and got a 
cheer, and we said good-bye all 
around, and faced eastward and rode 
away. 

Postscript. A Day Later. Soldier 
Boy was stolen last night. Cathy is 
almost beside herself, and we cannot 
comfort her. Mercedes and I are not 
much alarmed about the horse, al- 
though this part of Spain is in some- 
thing of a turmoil, politically, at 
M3 



A Horse's Tale 

present, and there is a good deal of 
lawlessness. In ordinary times the 
thief and the horse would soon be 
captured. We shall have them be- 
fore long, I think. 




XIV 

SOLDIER BOY — TO HIMSELF 

)T is five months. Or is it 
six? My troubles have 
clouded my memory. I 
think I have been all over 
this land, from end to end, and now I 
am back again since day before yes- 
terday, to that city which we passed 
through, that last day of our long 
journey, and which is near her coun- 
try home. I am a tottering ruin and 
my eyes are dim, but I recognized it. 
If she could see me she would know 
me and sound my call. I wish I 
i45 



A Horse's Tale 

could hear it once more; it would 
revive me, it would bring back her 
face and the mountains and the free 
life, and I would come — if I were 
dying I would come ! She would not 
know me, looking as I do, but she 
would know me by my star. But she 
will never see me, for they do not 
let me out of this shabby stable — a 
foul and miserable place, with most 
two wrecks like myself for com- 
pany. 

How many times have I changed 
hands ? I think it is twelve times — 
I cannot remember ; and each time it 
was down a step lower, and each time 
I got a harder master. They have 
been cruel, every one; they have 
worked me night and day in degraded 
employments, and beaten me; they 
146 



A Horse's Tale 

have fed me ill, and some days not 
at all. And so I am but bones, now, 
with a rough and frowsy skin humped 
and cornered upon my shrunken 
body — that skin which was once so 
glossy, that skin which she loved to 
stroke with her hand. I was the 
pride of the mountains and the Great 
Plains; now I am a scarecrow and 
despised. These piteous wrecks that 
are my comrades here say we have 
reached the bottom of the scale, the 
final humiliation ; they say that when 
a horse is no longer worth the weeds 
and discarded rubbish they feed to 
him, they sell him to the bull -ring 
for a glass of brandy, to make sport 
for the people and perish for their 
pleasure. 

To die — that does not disturb me; 
i47 



A Horse's Tale 

we of the service never care for death. 
But if I could see her once more! if I 
could hear her bugle sing again and 
say, "It is I, Soldier — come!" 




XV 

GENERAL ALISON TO MRS. DRAKE, THE 

colonel's WIFE 

return, now, to where 

1 was, and tell you the 
rest. We shall never 
know how she came to 

be there ; there is no way to account 
for it. She was always watching for 
black and shiny and spirited horses 
— watching, hoping, despairing, hop- 
ing again; always giving chase and 
sounding her call, upon the meagrest 
chance of a response, and breaking 
her heart over the disappointment; 
149 



A Horse's Talc 

always inquiring, always interested 
in sales-stables and horse accumula- 
tions in general. How she got there 
must remain a mystery. 

At the point which I had reached in 
a preceding paragraph of this account, 
the situation was as follows: two 
horses lay dying; the bull had scat- 
tered his persecutors for the moment, 
and stood raging, panting, pawing the 
dust in clouds over his back, when the 
man that had been wounded returned 
to the ring on a remount, a poor blind- 
folded wreck that yet had something 
ironically military about his bearing 
— and the next moment the bull had 
ripped him open and his bowels were 
dragging upon the ground and the 
bull was charging his swarm of pests 
again. Then came pealing through 
150 



A Horse's Tale 

the air a bugle-call that froze my blood 
— "It is I, Soldier — come /" I turned ; 
Cathy was flying down through the 
massed people; she cleared the para- 
pet at a bound, and sped towards that 
riderless horse, who staggered forward 
towards the remembered sound; but 
his strength failed, and he fell at her 
feet, she lavishing kisses upon him 
and sobbing, the house rising with 
one impulse, and white with horror! 
Before help could reach her the bull 
was back again — 

She was never conscious again in 
life. We bore her home, all mangled 
and drenched in blood, and knelt by 
her and listened to her broken and 
wandering words, and prayed for her 
passing spirit, and there was no 
comfort — nor ever will be, I think. 
151 



A Horse's Talc 

But she was happy, for she was far 
away under another sky, and com- 
rading again with her Rangers, and 
her animal friends, and the soldiers. 
Their names fell softly and caressingly 
from her lips, one by one, with pauses 
between. She was not in pain, but 
lay with closed eyes, vacantly mur- 
muring, as one who dreams. Some- 
times she smiled, saying nothing; 
sometimes she smiled when she ut- 
tered a name — such as Shekels, or 
BB, or Potter. Sometimes she was 
at her fort, issuing commands ; some- 
times she was careering over the plain 
at the head of her men ; sometimes she 
was training her horse ; once she said, 
reprovingly, " You are giving me the 
wrong foot; give me the left — don't 
you know it is good-bye ?" 
152 



A Horse's Tale 

After this, she lay silent some time ; 
the end was near. By-and-by she 
murmured, " Tired . . . sleepy . . . take 
Cathy, mamma." Then, "Kiss me, 
Soldier." For a little time she lay so 
still that we were doubtful if she 
breathed. Then she put out her 
hand and began to feel gropingly 
about; then said, "I cannot find it; 
blow 'taps.' "* It was the end. 



TAPS 



Slow 




Lights out." 



©a 



. * 



